Perkins won an open seat in the Louisiana House representing District 64 (the eastern Baton Rouge suburbs, including part of Livingston Parish) when he defeated Democrat Herman L. Milton of Baker 63 percent to 37 percent in the nonpartisan blanket primary held on October 21, 1995.[4] He was elected on a traditional conservative platform of strong families and limited government. Four years later, he was reelected without opposition.[5] He retired from the legislature in 2004, fulfilling a promise to serve no more than two terms.[6]

While in office, Perkins authored legislation to require Louisiana public schools to install Internet filtering software, to provide daily silent prayer, and to prevent what he termed "censorship of America's Christian heritage."[7] Notably, Perkins also authored the nation's first covenant marriage law, a voluntary type of marriage that permits divorce only in cases of physical abuse, abandonment, adultery, imprisonment or after two years of separation.[2][8]

Perkins opposed casino gambling in Louisiana, calling a 1996 plan to restrict the location of gambling riverboats to one side of the river, "putting lipstick on a hog". It doesn't make the bill any better, it just looks a little better."[9] Perkins was described as "staunchly anti-abortion" by Public Broadcasting Service which also credited him with working on law and order and economic development issues while in the state house.[2] Perkins was instrumental in increasing state regulation of Louisiana abortion clinics; he sponsored a law to require state licensing and sanitary inspections.[1][10]

Perkins was floated as a potential Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate against Mary Landrieu in the 2014 election.[11][12] Despite strongly criticising Bill Cassidy, the main Republican challenger to Landrieu, as "pretty weak on the issues", Perkins said in an interview in January 2014 that he would not run against Landrieu. He did however express interest in running for David Vitter's U.S. Senate Seat, should Vitter be elected Governor of Louisiana in 2015.[13]

According to the Baptist Press, Perkins' "concern about the influence of the homosexual movement" led to his involvement in the 1998 founding of the Louisiana Family Forum, a conservative faith-oriented, pro-life non-profit group.[14][15]

In September 2003, Perkins withdrew from the race for Louisiana state insurance commissioner to become the President of the conservative Christian Family Research Council (FRC).[16] In addition to his duties as president of the FRC, Perkins hosts an online program, Washington Watch Daily on FRC Radio.[17]

Perkins was involved in the 2005 controversy over the disconnection of life support for Terri Schiavo, a woman who had been in what the media called a "persistent vegetative state" for a number of years. After a final court order permitted Schiavo's husband to remove her feeding tube and thereby cause her to die, Perkins stated, "we should remember that her death is a symptom of a greater problem: that the courts no longer respect human life."[18]

In October 2008, Perkins called the passage of California Proposition 8 (which prohibited same sex marriage in the state) "more important than the presidential election", adding that the United States has survived despite picking bad presidents in the past but "we will not survive if we lose the institution of marriage."[19]

In 2005, Perkins opposed the filibustering of certain right-leaning federal judicial nominees by U.S. Senate Democrats, arguing that the Democrats were waging a "campaign against orthodox religious views",[20] and that the judicial nominees were being persecuted for their Christian faith.[21] He became one of the organizers and hosts of Justice Sunday, a series of events that sought to mobilize the evangelical Christian base in support of the nominees.[21][22]

In 2010, Perkins opposed the overturning of the "Don't ask, don't tell" law that prohibited people who were openly gay or lesbian from serving in the U.S. military. Perkins argued that the repeal would, among other things, infringe on the religious liberty of military chaplains and other service members holding orthodox Christian views.[23]

The definition ... is rooted in the order of nature itself. It promotes the continuation of the human race and the cooperation of a mother and a father in raising the children they produce. This union can only be protected through amending the United States Constitution. If it's not, activists will continue using the courts to sell a five-legged dog.[26]

Perkins is also a steadfast opponent of civil unions, which he has referred to as "counterfeit marriages" which "pose a serious threat to the health of our culture".[27]

On May 17, 2001, Perkins gave a speech to the Louisiana chapter of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC), a white supremacist group that has described black people as a "retrograde species of humanity".[28] Perkins claimed not to know the group's ideology at the time, but it had been widely publicized in Louisiana and the nation, just two years earlier. The Duke incident surfaced again in the local press in 2002, when Perkins ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate.[29]

In 2010, the Family Research Council—under Perkins' leadership—was classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center which characterized the group as "a fount of anti-gay propaganda".[30][31] Perkins dismissed the hate group designation as a political attack on the FRC by a "liberal organization" and as part of "the left's smear campaign of conservatives".[31] On December 15, 2010 the FRC ran an open letter advertisement in two Washington, D.C. newspapers disputing the SPLC's action. The letter included the signatures of social conservative politicians including twenty members of the House of Representatives (including then soon-to-be Speaker John Boehner), three U.S. senators, four state governors, and one state attorney general.[32]

In the spring of 2013, Perkins urged conservatives nationwide to withhold political contributions to the national Republican Party until the leadership "grows a backbone" and halts support for so many of the Democratic legislative initiatives.[33]